This is what it looks like when the American empire is fully committed to its death spiral. Skyrocketing gas prices, massive inflation, an economy on the verge of collapse, a quagmire war in the Middle East, a demented fascist in the White House, a Republican-majority Congress engaged in internecine warfare and I could keep going. And to top it all of, a MAGA-packed Supreme Court fully committed to dismantling America’s civil rights and voting rights. Congrats to everyone who voted for all of this.
The Supreme Court on Wednesday struck down a voting map in Louisiana, and with it dealt a blow to a landmark civil rights law and opened the door for other states to redraw their congressional maps in ways that could affect elections for years to come.
It is unclear how the decision, which split 6-3 along ideological lines, will impact November’s midterm elections amid redistricting battles that have raged in multiple states, but several are moving to draw new congressional maps in time. The decision is likely to create new Republican districts across the South for future elections, for the presidential election in 2028 and beyond.
Florida’s legislature approved a new Republican-friendly map within hours of the court’s ruling, and state officials across the South signaled they would pursue changes to their maps that would take effect in time for elections in November.
In its ruling, the Supreme Court’s conservative majority held that lawmakers had violated the law when they used race when drawing up a new majority-Black district. Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., writing for the majority, said that the court had kept intact the Voting Rights Act but that Louisiana’s new district violated the equal protection clause of the Constitution.
The majority asserted that the opinion preserved a central tenet of the Voting Rights Act, but the court’s liberal wing, in dissent, argued that the justices had taken the final step to dismantle the landmark civil rights law.
I’m thinking again about how often Hillary Clinton reminded voters in 2016 that the Supreme Court was on the line. Hillary’s prescient warnings were not only ignored, they were scorned. People attacked her for being cynical and extremist for suggesting that decades of civil rights, women’s rights and voting rights could be undone if Donald Trump got to pack SCOTUS. Well, sign your work, MAGA voters. Sign your work, “both sides are the same” voters. Sign your work, journalists who enabled all of this for access to Dementia Don.
Photos courtesy of Backgrid, Cover Images.
